Reviewing Thick as Thieves presents an interesting challenge. The game is incredibly short, and has the price tag to match. It’s also, in subtle ways, one of the most ambitious stealth games I’ve seen in a while. And with names like Warren Spector (Deus Ex, Thief: Deadly Shadows), and Paul Neurath (Thief: The Dark Project, Thief: The Metal Age) attached, the ambition at display in the first-person stealth game will definitely raise quite a few eyebrows.
"When I say Thick as Thieves is a stealth game, I really mean it."
Thick as Thieves is a callback to classic stealth games, like the Thief series, where players are thrown into a level with a couple of missions, and it’s left entirely up to them how they want to deal with it. Curiously, the title makes use of a gameplay structure similar to what we’ve seen from extraction shooters; get into a level, loot as many things as possible, and potentially even try to finish up a contract or two to continue the story. Along the way, if you happen to get spotted and killed by a patrolling guard or a turret, you’ll lose anything you were carrying with you, be it loot or even keys.
When I say Thick as Thieves is a stealth game, I really mean it. Taking on a mission head-on is essentially suicide, since there’s no real way to fight back. Rather, you’re given a variety of tools that you can swap between to handle different situations. A crank gun, for instance, allows you to grapple on to nearby ledges. The smoke grenade, on the other hand, will let you obfuscate enemy line of sight, giving you the chance to slip by without raising any alarms. All in all, there are six distinct tools, including bottled up fairies that can pick pockets and flick switches, and even antagonistic bottled fairies that can cause distractions by yelling curses at nearby guards.
The general stealth gameplay is quite simple, and works on the tried-and-tested Thief method of mixing in line of sight, light levels, and sound. The game even provides you with a prominent gem at the bottom of the screen that lets you know how visible you might be in any sort of lighting, and moving around even lets you know how much noise you might be making.
The moment-to-moment gameplay of Thick as Thieves is tense, slow, and deliberate. You’re never going to rush into things because even just walking upright has the tendency to create sound and make you more visible under even the dimmest of lights. This means you will be crawling around slowly, waiting to observe guard patrol routes, and taking your time in picking out your routes. This is all helped by the fact that the two levels in the game are beautifully designed with many intricate layers that offer a variety of options through them, depending on the tools you have at hand and the difficulty you’ve picked.
"The moment-to-moment gameplay of Thick as Thieves is tense, slow, and deliberate."
Since there are just two levels in the game, the entire experience has been designed around the idea that you will be going through the same levels many times throughout the story. But if you’re concerned about this starting to feel repetitive, you have little to worry about. Just about every one of your attempts at a given level will start you out in different locations, and introduces subtle changes to things like guard patrols and turrets. This is further boosted with the option to play at higher difficulty levels, which brings in more guards, enemies that have special abilities, and more challenging objectives with stricter time limits.
The story of Thick as Thieves doesn’t really delve too deeply into any intricate lore, character arcs, or world-building. By the end of the tutorial, you find yourself in possession of a magical gem that allows you to see through walls to spot nearby guards and treasure. The rest of the story largely revolves around hopping back and forth between the two levels: Constables’ Guildhall and Elway Manor. While missions start off simple—get your hands on police documents investigating the gem and figuring out why the Elway family has a special interest in the gem to begin with—before slowly escalating as you get further in your attempts to finally fence the gem off.
One of the most compelling things about the game is how well it melds early 1900s industrial decor and architecture inspired by a fusion of art deco and gothic styles, and the presence of magic in the overall world. Even the weirdest things you might find in the game never really feel out of place thanks to how well the art and gameplay work together.
The fact that there are only two levels feels like a major missed opportunity for Thick as Thieves. The two stages already showcase quite a bit of personality, and made me get invested in the world almost instantly thanks to its vibrant art style and interesting architecture. Unfortunately, however, any more story you might be looking for is relegated to random sound bites you might overhear while sneaking around behind a guard, or perhaps even hidden documents here and there.
Thick as Thieves being so short also leads to running out of things to unlock as you get your hands on more treasure, and by extension, more money. At a certain point, there just isn’t really anything left to unlock aside from cosmetic items for your character, which in turn feels pointless outside of the co-op mode since the game takes place entirely in first-person.
"The fact that there are only two levels feels like a major missed opportunity for Thick as Thieves."
Length isn’t the only issue Thick as Thieves suffers from either; the title is lacking in many options that would be otherwise basic in any other games. It is sorely lacking in things like a field of view slider and rebindable controls. Along with this, even the mouse sensitive setting is strange, since, instead of giving you a slider that can be used to fine-tune the setting, you instead get three options: low, medium, and high.
Despite these issues, I couldn’t really help but keep jumping back into Thick as Thieves. The general gameplay loop felt quite addictive, and I would be lying if I said that I didn’t miss intricate level design that we last only saw in games made by Arkane, like Deathloop or Dishonored 2. Stealth games as a whole feel like an endangered breed, with the gameplay style largely serving as an optional way to accomplish things in titles that are otherwise more action-heavy.
Thick as Thieves is also the rare game in the genre that supports co-op play, which also ties into its highly-replayable nature. Rather than giving you the same objectives as in solo mode, playing in co-op changes things up so that both players have to work together to complete all of the objectives in time.
The ultimate saving grave of Thick as Thieves is its price tag. Since it just costs $5, the fact that it only has two levels feels a lot more forgivable than if it were priced any higher. Despite its short runtime, Thick as Thieves offers plenty of fun, especially for players that enjoy revisiting large, intricate levels to play around and experiment. Ultimately, it feels like an easy game to recommend, especially after offering plenty of warnings about its lack of what would otherwise be basic features.
This game was reviewed on PC.
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